Bad Air Quality In Jakarta, Menparekraf Sandiaga Will Increase Public Transportation, Employees Asked For WFH

Illustration of air pollution in Jakarta (ANTARA)

JAKARTA - Minister of Tourism and Creative Economy (Menparekraf) as well as Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources (ESDM) Ad Interim Sandiaga Uno acknowledged that the air quality in the Jakarta, Bogor, Tangerang and Bekasi (Jabodetabek) areas is getting worse.

"Indeed, the air quality in Jabodetabek is increasingly concerning, especially due to several phenomena, namely transportation, industry, and also the weather, but we have announced that the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy will move quickly to deal with this problem," Sandiaga said in The Weekly Brief with Sandi Uno which was held in Jakarta as reported by ANTARA, Monday, August 14.

He said he would give direct instructions to employees within the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy to re-implement work from home (WFH) and appeal to use public transportation in their activities so that they are expected to be able to reduce air pollution.

Sandiaga said he would also start not to use the car even though the vehicle he was using was an electric car.

"And I started using public transportation and ran to the office as part of reducing pollution in Indonesia," he said.

Sandiaga also said that the determination of WFH for Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy employees will be determined in the next one to two weeks with a guide for four days WFH and one day working in the office or work from office (WFO)

Meanwhile, in the long term, he said there needs to be an increase in the green open space, conversions from industries that do not use environmentally friendly energy and several super priority tourist destinations will be directed to take advantage of electrification.

"I feel pollution myself, because I ran in the morning and we have to be able to bring good air quality, because that's what our tourists see," he concluded.